Check out the amazing winners of our spring painting contests

Our most recent contests for the Spring of 2013 Our Turner Watercolor Contest and our SoHo Urban Artist Contest, I must say were very successful. We received so many amazing entries from all of our talented artist friends, it was extremely hard to pick a winner in either contest. It took multiple rounds of voting, but here's who we decided was the best of the best!

First up, our Turner Spring Painting Contest Winners

First Place Winner

"Peaceful Water Garden"by Kimberly Wakeman

"I am a HUGE fan of Turner Watercolors because of their brilliant color hues, smooth blending with the water on the paper, and super mix-ability which allows me to create subtle, moody watercolor scapes, or bolder, brighter watercolor scenes. You will be SO pleased with the Turner Watercolor range! I am hooked!"

Second Place Winner

"Out of It"by Marcel Franquelin

"I draw in graphite, charcoal, soft pastel and pen and ink. I paint with oil, acrylics (airbrushed) and watercolor. I like to pick the medium best suited for my subject. Watercolor is the least forgiving medium of all; it is all about preparation, long thinking and fast acting. because of its difficulty, it can get quite pricey and frustrating, especially when the colors do not "react" as intended, turning out to look weak, or fading away with time. Turner watercolors are reasonably priced, concentrated and lightfast; what's not to like? Watercolor work is demanding enough to the artist, having a medium of quality on your side is a must, and I definitely recommend Turner"

Third Place Winner

"Southern Migration by Moonlight"by Frank Wilson

"As a full time, professional artist since 1971, I have tried and experimented with many brands of gouache paint. I have found that, among them all, Turner Designer Gouache is my choice color because it is consistently superior in the dense pigment load and exact color match from tube to tube. I easily make rich, vibrant textures and broken color with a velvety finish with Turner Gouache that are often mistaken to be pastels! Turner Designer Gouachelends itself to the wide variety of application methods that I use in each of my paintings; sponging, scrubbing, knife painting, splattering, dip-pens, airbrushing, as well as the use of more traditional hog bristle, camel hair and sable brushes. The realism I achieve is made easier because I know my paints are consistent from batch to batch and I can depend on the full color saturation of Turner Designer Gouache to achieve very deep to very delicate passages of color, and heavy, rich textures. Even the engineering of the tubes is superior to other brands resulting in ease of use and less color loss! I heartily recommend Turner Gouache paints to my gouache workshop participants."

"I love the smoothness of and drying time of SoHo Paints. It gives me just enough time for it to dry from week to week. I also love the brilliance of these paints and how easily they glide onto the canvas and how, like people they mingle with interaction."

Second Place Winner

"Qipao"by Wendy Wu

"I bought a set of SoHo Urban Artist colored pencils and it turns out to be perfect for this image. The brilliant shades of red make the Qipao dress come to life. I wanted the whole painting to have a warm color scheme and I was able to blend layers of color to get that effect. I would definitely recommend SoHo colored pencils to other artists"

Third Place Winner

"Man and His Best Friend"by Armando Araujo

"Since moving to the US a year ago, I have been to the Jerry's Artarama stores. Once I began buying SoHo products, I was amazed. I feel it is a quality product as well as a good priced one. I have many brands that I could choose but I do prefer SoHo"

Tips on why you should make your art digital today!

In the internet age we live in, many artists are going digital. With a simple Google search, we have access to more works of art than ever. And by putting artwork online, artists can gain many benefits. Some of these benefits include:

Find potential buyers

Make digital copies to keep your art safe

share your artwork with others

Look at your artwork in new ways

First, it allows you to share your artwork with others. Whether you are trying to sell your artwork online, gain exposure and notoriety, or just share it with your friends and family, making digital copies for online distribution is a great idea. With a digital copy, you can crop, shade, lighten, or find some way to optimize your piece of art and share it the best way possible when you cannot see it from the easel in real life. Having these copies on your computer will also save you time when you need to send a picture of your piece for a perspective buyer or possibly for a contest. Many Jerry's Artarama artists know this too well and have entered our many contests we have all the time. The recent winner of our 2013 Charvin contest was very aware of this when he won with this piece:

Putting your artwork online also allows you to look at your artwork in a different way. It can shed new light on what your strengths and weaknesses are. Want to learn about your use of shadows or how light penetrates your body of work? Put any piece of art through photoshop and find out which way your painting or work of art looks best when not shown on an easel or framed. This will also let you judge your art in a new way so that you can learn from it when you create future works of art.

Adding your artwork to a digital network is also a great way to protect it in case of theft or environmental factors like fire or flooding destroying your art. And if you are worried about any sort of online theft, there are many ways to protect your art online as well. You can add watermarks over your image making it harder for any thief to steal the image. Another option would be to disable right clicks from your website or photo sharing site you have posted on. This will stop people from being able to "Save Image" from their computers, protecting your artwork.

Being able to expose and market your artwork online is a necessity for artists in this day and age. So consider making digital copies for all of your artwork. If you would like to learn more about gaining exposure and marketing your art for sale or online distribution, check out our amazing Art Career Experts DVD series.

Mungyo Gallery Soft Pastels & Fabriano Artistico Watercolor Paper

Often, the best way to find out about a hot product on the market is to listen to what your friends and fellow artists have to say about it. We do this all the time. So today, we decided to check out the buzz on two of our featured products, Mungyo Gallery Soft Pastels and Fabriano Artistico Watercolor Paper!

First up is Mungyo Gallery Soft Pastels. These artist-grade pastels are hand-rolled, making them softer and easier to blend. Artists love them for their brilliant colors and because they don't fade over time. They are definitely the go-to pastels on the market right now. But don't take our word for it. Lets see what the buzz is all about!

"Not too hard, not too soft. Creamy. Really beautiful colors. They don't crumble when you break them in half/thirds. Love how they feel!!" -Paula, Tennessee

"This set has a marvelous range of colors. All seem to apply smoothly, controlled and consistent. Works with blended and raw strokes with equal ease." - The Light Bender, Florida

"Gallery soft pastels, like the three little bears bedtime story, are not too soft, not too hard, just right. Many pastels are too hard, crumbly or to soft for all around use. I have found Gallery pastels perform well from the preliminary sketch to the final spark of color at the center of interest. Gallery soft pastels range from subtle colors to the brilliant. Finding the right color is easily done. Gallery Pastels can achieve very soft edges to hard edges. If you were to buy only one brand of pastel, I would recommend Gallery soft pastels by Mungyo". -James, New Mexico

"Last year I was invited to review the new Gallery Handmade Soft Pastels in a focus group at Jerry's. The labels were peeled off, so we couldn't tell what brand we were using...the Gallery Handmade Soft Pastels were just as strong in pigment, soft, creamy and completely covered the paper as richly as their more costly competitors. They layered and blended beautifully. I highly recommend them as a quality product with a more economical pricetag! Jerry's has done it again...go out and try them today!" - Kim, North Carolina,

"Over the years I have acquired, tested and used not only every pastel on the market, but the varied and assorted pastel surfaces that make this such a unique and individual medium for use in my professional art business! . Much to my delight, I found the [Mungyo] Pastels comparable in every way to the Unison and Rembrandt pastels that I have favored over the years. Their texture, colors and smooth, buttery consistency were equal in every way.....except in price. When you add high quality to cost effectiveness for the working artist, well, it just doesn't get any better than that!" - M Theresa Brown, North Carolina

Looks like people like the Mungyo Gallery Soft Pastels for its texture and blending ability. Try them out yourself and let us know what you think. We're sure you'll love them.

Next up is the Fabriano Artistico Watercolor Paper. Artists have been raving about how great this paper is! They say its strong, holds watercolor paints better than its leading competitors and is incredibly versatile! But once again, lets put it to the test and see what the buzz is all about.

"Excellent quality, easy to work on." -Kitty, Wisconsin

"I tried a few sheets and was totally impressed by how beautifully it accepts color. The surface has a velvety tooth and the paper easily tolerates scrubbing when lifting colors. Also, unlike all other watercolor papers I've used, the Fabriano Artistico 300 lb. Cold Press shows minimal distortion when wet... and always dries completely flat. I now use Fabriano Artistico exclusively. A truly superb paper." -Dr. A, Oregon

"I love this paper. It takes a lot of abuse and continues to perform. I do my best work on this paper." -Patti the Art Student, Oregon

Well, looks like Fabriano Artistico Watercolor Paper lives up to the hype with its strength and durability! Here at Jerry's we are always striving to carry the best products on the line, the ones Artists are always asking about, the ones that create a buzz. So we will continue to look for the products you're crazy for and sharing what we find each week with two featured products we know you love! Thanks always for your input and look out for more Whats the Buzz coming up next week!